Killed After Dispute Over Coat

By

Pervaiz Shallwani

Updated Jan. 6, 2013 9:45 p.m. ET

A 16-year-old boy targeted in an alleged dispute over his designer jacket was fatally shot by another teenage boy for whom New York City police were searching on Sunday evening, a law-enforcement official said.

Raphael Ward, an athletic young man who dreamed of helping his mother leave the projects, was gunned down on Friday night about a block from his home in the Baruch Houses on the Lower East Side, authorities said.

Investigators were still piecing together the circumstances leading up to the shooting, but one clue reverberated through the neighborhood as friends and family mourned: Raphael was killed after a run-in Friday night with a group of young men who asked about his green Polo Ralph Lauren jacket, the official said.

ENLARGE

Mourners at a make-shift at memorial Sunday for Raphael Ward in front of the Lower East Side store where the 16-year-old was shot and killed.
PJ Smith for The Wall Street Journal

By Sunday, police were searching for another boy no older than 16, last seen wearing a different green jacket with blue jeans, a black hoodie, a dark-colored wool hat and a mask covering the lower part of his face, the official said.

The search for a suspect and details about the killing emerged Sunday as those who knew Raphael struggled to come to terms with how he died.

"He was a good kid," said Raphael's cousin, Nae Delgado, 20, of Westchester County. "He didn't cause trouble. I grew up here, this is the first place I ever lived, and we never got into trouble, nothing,"

The homicide was the first of 2013 in Manhattan, where the number of such deaths dropped to 64 in 2012 from 68 in 2011. Manhattan homicides are down sharply since 2001, when the borough recorded 102 murders.

It was also the first homicide in more than a year in the city's Seventh Precinct, which covers the Lower East Side, a historically immigrant neighborhood that has undergone wholesale changes in the past two decades.

The Baruch Houses remain a pocket of poverty on the neighborhood's eastern edge, a world apart from the area's rising rents, trendy restaurants and vibrant bar scene.

Raphael lived there with his mother, Ali Delgado, and his little brother. His mother couldn't be reached for comment.

His friends and family said Raphael had largely avoided trouble in the housing project, though he was arrested two months ago on juvenile charges of marijuana possession, the law-enforcement official said.

ENLARGE

Raphael Ward
Raphael Ward via Facebook

Ms. Delgado said her cousin avoided the neighborhood's gangs. "He thought that if you couldn't run by yourself then you weren't brave," Ms. Delgado said.

Police said they were still investigating, but a partial picture of Friday night's circumstances had come together Sunday.

On Friday night around 9 p.m., a worried Raphael approached three friends inside John Best Pizza restaurant on Columbia Street near his home, the law-enforcement official said.

He told them he had just been approached by a group of guys who asked about his coat. Raphael told his friends he believed one of them had a gun, the official said.

The four went outside to see the group, the official said. The three friends told police they left Raphael and ran into a nearby deli "to get bottles to use as weapons."

When the three returned, they saw Raphael at the intersection of Rivington and Columbia streets holding a stick, the official said. One witness said he saw a young man raise his hand, and then heard a gunshot.

The three ran back into the deli, the official said. Raphael followed and "informs them that he has been shot, and subsequently collapses," the official said.

First responders arrived to find Raphael with a gunshot wound to the chest. He was still wearing his jacket. He was taken to Beth Israel Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

Linda Mitchell, 41, a friend of the family, said she was in her apartment near the scene of the shooting when she heard a loud sound.

She ran downstairs to see Raphael being carted to the ambulance, covered with a sheet.

"The mother was by the ambulance," she said. "You heard the scream, you have to be a mom to understand it. It was from the gut."

On Sunday, an improvised memorial had been set up at the scene, including candles, a poster and candy bars. Bags of chocolate-covered pretzels were placed above the candles.

A memorial for Raphael is scheduled Monday followed by a funeral on Wednesday at Provenzano Lanza Funeral Home in the East Village.

Family and friends said Raphael was raised by a single mother who had worked hard to keep her children out of trouble.

"His mother worked her butt off so he would have anything he needed so he didn't have to be out here stealing," said Jazmine White, 19, who said she had been friends with Raphael since she was 8.

His nickname, "Tokyo," was scrawled into the sidewalk. Raphael loved Japanese pop culture, including graphic novels. He played baseball and basketball.

"He wanted to play baseball," said Nkenge Foster, 16, a friend. "He wanted to get his mother out of the hood."

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